Stranger still is the notion that such a musically timeless record as Cohen's debut could emerge in 1967, a year whose other great records now sound dated by comparison. Then again, Cohen was 33 years old by the time his…
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For an artform in which sound is everything, popular music has been blessed with strangely little poetry: There may be no other genre where high-mindedness falls with such a thud. Leonard Cohen remains the most striking exception, not just for the genuine seriousness of his music or the adulation of his audience, but for the ability of the former to survive the latter.
The most powerful song on the album may be "Seems So Long Ago, Nancy," which returns to the subject of suicide, and to an acquaintance of Cohen's who was mentioned in certain earlier works, including the missing verse of "Suzanne." Here the artist's voice was recorded with a heavy layer of reverb, sounding as if he were half a house away from the microphone, and underpinning the song is an almost disturbingly simple, unornamented electric organ: not so much Farfisa as something one might hear at a low-budget funeral parlor.
And in the hollow of the night
When you are cold and numb…
Critics agreed: At the time of its release in 1974, New Skin for the Old Ceremony was hailed as Leonard Cohen's best to date: gratifying, I suppose, in light of the very mixed reception accorded his first four albums. (To see what America's leading counterculture mag had to say about Songs of Leonard Cohen, for example, plug "Leonard Cohen," "Rolling Stone," and "flaming shits" into the search engine of your choice.) That in itself is a bit of a shock, given Cohen's current status as a critics' favorite, but I suppose his fondness for the imagery of war in general and his own occasional…
We all recognize that the Super Audio Compact Disc, despite being an almost ideal format for high-resolution audio, has not replaced the "Red Book" CD. However, Sam Tellig's comments in the June and July issues of Stereophile, and Steve Guttenberg's "As We See It" in July, unleashed e-mails urging me to champion multichannel sound (don't I do this already?) and smite the unbelievers (not a chance).
I can't find fault with Steve's disparaging comments about multichannel pop and rock recordings. In fact, I share his disappointment at their failure for one self-serving reason: The success…
I figured that getting the biggest traps would reduce the number I needed, and sometime last year I came across Ready Acoustics' announcement of their Chameleon Super Sub Bass Traps. What appealed was their manageable size: 48" high by 24" wide by 6" thick. That last dimension makes the Chameleon among the thickest trap available in a cosmetically acceptable package. (Ready Acoustics offers them in eight fabric covers and four frame colors.) Now, I know some folks like patterns and pictures on their panels, but we prefer that these big guys call no more attention to themselves than is…
The AS-EQ1 software steps the user through the procedure, which includes choosing one or two subs, then balancing the sub-level settings with the main speakers. Remember that output RCA? Connect it to an unprocessed, un-bass-managed input, and the software will prompt you to balance sub and main with equal outputs at 75dB. That done, the AS-EQ1 will provide the familiar Audyssey test signals to each of the connected speakers. SVS recommends a minimum of eight microphone positions (with a maximum of 32 for very large rooms), and the subtleties of mike positioning are similar to those of other…
Sidebar 1: Contacts
Meridian Audio Ltd., Latham Road, Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire PE29 6YE, England, UK. Tel: (44) (0)1480-445678. Fax: (44) (0)1480-445686. US distributor: Meridian America Inc., 8055 Troon Circle, Suite C, Austell, GA 30168-7849. Tel: (404) 344-7111. Fax: (404) 346-7111. Web: www.meridian-audio.com.
Ready Acoustics LLC, PO Box 626, Elk River, MN 55330. Tel: (800) 820-5044. Fax: (866) 320-1800. Web: www.readyacoustics.com.
SVSound, 6420 Belmont Avenue, Girard, OH 44420. Tel: (877) 626-5623, (703) 845-1472. Fax: (585) 486-1787. Web: www.svsound.com.
Sidebar 2: Recordings In The Round
JORDI SAVALL & ANDREW LAWRENCE-KING: The Celtic Viol
Irish & Scottish Airs & Dances, traditional & by Fraser, Gow, Macpherson, Marshal, O'Carolan
Jordi Savall, treble viols; Andrew Lawrence-King, Irish harp, psalterium
AliaVox AVSA 9865 (SACD/CD)
I am not knowledgeable about this music, but I have great respect for Jordi Savall and so can recommend this recording simply for its sound. One need not know much about the lovely, melodious tunes that emerge from the instruments to find them infectious. Moreover, the warm…
LUKA BLOOM: Riverside
Reprise 26092-1 (LP), -2 (CD). Mike Krowiak, eng.; Jeffrey Wood, prod. ADA/ADD. TT: 44:31
Reprise 26092-1 (LP), -2 (CD). Mike Krowiak, eng.; Jeffrey Wood, prod. ADA/ADD. TT: 44:31
Can't tell you how many singer/songwriters I've heard live before they ever got signed up, before they could even afford a band, just them and a guitar up there making us feel like that (as Joni Mitchell used to sing). Finally the first album comes out, and wha-a-a-a? The sleeve lists three producers, eight engineers, thirty session musicians (including two synthesizer players, but not counting the strings), a Brazilian percussionist, and none of the songs I've heard the…
Stereophile: You are president of Esoteric Audio Research, a British manufacturer of tube amplifiers, and a world-renowned designer of tube equipment and output transformers. I thought we'd begin with a little background. Where were you born? What kind of education did you get to prepare you for a career in audio?
De Paravicini: I was born in 1945 in Nigeria, of all places, of British parents. My father was in Nigeria at the time as a geologist. I was taken back to England at the age of 7 for education, and there I went on to what we call Technical College and did Electrical Engineering…